Elsie Vaalbooi

Who is Elsie Vaalbooi?

Elsie Vaalbooi of Rietfontein in the Northern Cape was a South African woman who was a member of the ǂKhomani San or Bushmen and one of the last speakers of the Nǁng language. In the 1990s there was concern amongst the ǂKhomani leadership about loss of the Nǁng language: many of those of the community who could speak a KhoeSan language actually spoke Nama. Linguist Anthony Traill interviewed Vaalbooi in 1997, when she was in her late nineties. The South African San Institute became involved in the pursuit of information on the language and, with the help of Vaalbooi, they were able to trace a further ten people who could speak the language.